Sons and Daughters

Mrs. Oliphant's Sons and Daughters opens as a sharp Victorian family drama in which duty, inheritance, and personal conviction collide. When Gervase Burton refuses to enter his father's prosperous business, he ignites a bitter struggle over what sons owe their parents, and what a man may claim as his own life. His love for Madeline Thursley deepens the conflict, for marriage now seems to depend on money, status, and the harsh expectations of two proud families. As fortunes shift, a shocking collapse of Burton, Baber, & Company leaves Gervase stranded, guilty, and afraid that his defiance has helped bring ruin on his name. Returning to London, he finds his father vanished, the household eerily preserved, and the old order broken. From there the novel follows Gervase's painful attempts to settle debts, protect honor, and make sense of a mysterious ten-thousand-pound payment that may be a blessing or a deceit. Madeline, practical yet devoted, stands beside him as love, conscience, and class feeling test them both. This edition has been fully restored with modern typesetting, custom cover design.